Whew, close call!

Err... I guess I won't be getting any karma from you anytime soon

This is my first tank and I am certain I'll be upgrading to a 75 - 125 long before the Blue Tang reaches 3" or 4", just keeping my eyes on CL for a real bargain. Plus I might be moving across the country within a year and would prefer to make sure that falls through before I get the larger tank that I want.

 

It was good overall. The bags weren't as airtight as I thought they'd be, I was expecting the bag to be large and fully inflated, but the metal pins weren't quite achieving that, but that's really not a big deal as long as the water doesn't drain out. The water was a little dirty also, IMO, though I don't know what to expect for a fish being in about 3-4 cups of water for ~26 hours.

It's shipped overnight (standard, though, so that means by 3pm, and for me it was 2:13 pm, so I was a little worried as it gets very hot here). Of course you can pay more to upgrade.

Also, unless I'm mistaken, pretty much all LFS get their fish shipped anyway, so I figure why not buy from a huge and reputable dealer myself and save some money (even with shipping! my LFS can be a serious ripoff depending on what it is).

Plus you have the 14 day guarantee, which I don't think my LFS has. So I would definitely recommend, but I'm new to this.

Oh, and just remembered, I orded a CUC from their Florida facility and everything went smoothly as well. Too bad my sea slug got sucked into my air pump, he was just too curious.

 

Unless you are in Florida or Hawaii, ALL marine fish have been flown in. Anything from the wild can be in export for 24 - 48 hours... then many times flown one more time to the dealer.

Bags do not need to be fully inflated.. actually that can be a bad thing given altitude and density of the pack.

For the size of the fish, that sounds like a lot of water. They need far less then you think.

 

As long as they can stay wet they are fine. Even though fish "breathe" water, they get the oxygen out of the air. Some dealers/shippers even put pure oxygen in the bag to increase the time the fish can stay in the bag.

 

@ Gresham - Yea, that's what I figured, I don't see how else they could get them. And for all I know, they buy from a distributor in Charlotte who places mass orders from LiveAquaria himself/herself!

@ som3 reef3r - I may have overstated the water amount, it seemed reasonable, but if it was too much, then that wouldn't help explain the dirtiness of it. But again, I'm new to this and don't know how clean the water should look for a 26 hour trip. The fish are small, though, and that's a lot of pooping for one day, I will say that.

 

Liveaquaria is a great place. I've ordered from them afew times all positive experiences

 

There are plenty of appropriately sized fish for a 40 gallon aquarium. Doesn't it make more sense to upgrade the tank then the fish?

 

I guess it depends (and I'm assuming you mean, "Doesn't it make more sense NOT to upgrade the tank rather than just downsizing the fish", let me know if I'm misreading your post though).

I absolutely love the blue tang and don't mind upgrading tanks to accomodate his needs once he gets bigger in a year or so. Plus since this is my first tank, I'm bound to make a lot of mistakes and a year from now might not mind an excuse to start from scratch!

I bought my 40 already plumbed and ready to go, so I would like to learn and a year from now, do all the plumbing myself and create the whole design from scratch.

 

What I am saying is it makes more sense to buy fish that will fit into the tank you currently own instead of what you "might" own in the future. Its kinda like me living in a one bedroom apartment and buying a baby cow with the premise that I will buy a farm soon. I understand wanting something but by not resisting the urge to do something that is not in the best interest of your fish is not good aquarium husbandry.IMO